Power outages-What do you do?

[magsdez]

Hi all. We lost power last night for about 4 hrs. I have 1 battery powered air pump which I used on the 75 gal and 2 APC battery backups for the air pump in my 12 gal. Those are my 2 main concern tanks. I was wondering, what do you all do when you loose power? I've noticed the battery backups don't last long enough, which is why I took my computer's once the one on the 12 gal ran out of power. Is there anything you all are concerned about when power's out for an extended time?

Inquiring minds (that can't get any sleep with outages) want to know.

[eleontie]

The only difference is that it all gets very quiet around ... so I just enjoy the silence.

I would only worry if the power is out for more than 48hrs, other than that ... sit back and relax I do not think your fish will get affected.

[krisw]

I second elontie's thoughts. I would only worry if the season makes your overall house temperature drop below say 55 degrees, or go above 85/90. Even then, you would want to be careful not to shock the fish by trying to make any impromptu adjustments. I usually just keep an eye on the tanks, and let whatever's going to happen, happen -- which is usually nothing.

[mhossom]

WOW, that is sure different than the reef world. People have backup generators and power invertors to keep critical systems running. 4 hours of stagnant water can be a death sentence in a reef tank.

I'm more certain than ever of my decision to switch from salt to fresh.

[sherrymitchell]

I had a power outage at school. The power was out on my 55 freshwater tank for about 20 hours. I did not have a battery powered air pump, so I opened the top on the tank to get as much air in there as possible. I did not feed the fish that day because I wanted no extra ammonia in the tank.

After it was all over and power was restored, I did a big water change -- like 75% of the water -- and the fish were fine.....

If we had gone with a longer power outage, I would have done a water change and stirred up the new water with PRIME dechlorinator which also neutralizes ammonia and nitrate.

[finman57]

I used to use a power inverter. Hooked to my truck and ran line into the house. It was enough to run a fan, a light, tv and the air pump that runs 49 of the tanks.

3 years ago I bought a generator. Have not had to use it.
Its just like a snow blower. great insurance. Never snows for a couple years after you buy one. lol

[magsdez]

ok, so what happens in the winter time? Scott and his father lost a lot of fish during the ice storm of 93 when they lost power for a week. Suggestions for winter time? What about if the temp in the summer gets too high?

[sherrymitchell]

Well, in the summer time I suppose you could add bags of ice to float in the water and do big water changes. If you add it directly into the water you'd have to add dechlor -- this assuming the local 7-11 has power and ice. You could also close draperies, hook up battery driven fans, cover the tank with a cold, wet towel.

Winter time is a different story. That could be utterly disasterous....

[finman57]

I have a Kerosine (sp) heater that I have used in the basement in the winter.
Years ago I lost power and that kept the temp in the basement up for about 10 hours that I was out. I also have a few old packing blankets that I wrapped around the 90-gallon tank that was not in the fishroom. I did not have the inverter or the generator back then.
They did fine.

At my old house I lost for 24 hours once but had a wood stove in the basement near the area I had my tanks. The problem was keeping the temp down when I used the stove. About once ever couple hours I just reached in and stirred the water some. lol

[JMLenke]

If it involves a large area outage, I do my best with what I have..